and we’d followed the trail back to the original article.
That’s why the senior readers had hurtled down to London. To track Ivy Shaw.
I was right: the file confirmed she had died of natural causes, just after the article in the
Winslow Chronicle
.
Mum had posed as another journalist and interviewed some of the family as soon as the senior team arrived down south.
I clicked on the audio and heard Mum’s voice, introducingherself as Louise Allan, a freelance journalist. She was using a soft Irish accent – she says the only useful things she ever got from my dad was the skill of faking different accents.
She asked the interviewees to introduce themselves, for levels on the digital recorder.
“I’m Reginald Shaw, Ivy Shaw’s son.”
“I’m Reginald’s older son, James Shaw.”
“I’m Reginald’s younger son, Vincent Shaw.”
“I’m James’s younger daughter, Lucy Kingston Shaw. My older sister Vivien isn’t here, she’s got a debating competition at school. Anyway, she doesn’t think we should talk to you, not now Nana’s dead. Did your recorder pick all that up?”
I sat back hard when I heard Vivien’s sister. There was nothing wrong with Lucy Shaw’s voice. She had a perfectly nice middle-class BBC English voice. But she sounded like a happy and alive version of Vivien. Exactly like and completely different from the terrified girl in the van.
I shivered and clicked on Mum’s transcript instead. The first part of the interview covered the same ground as the local article: Ivy came from Jamaica to study, then she did vital war work, she became a teacher, had a family, and now her family think her work should be recognised, blah blah blah…
There were also notes under each answer from Uncle Hugh, who posed as a photographer so he could act as a truth-tester. Voice readers aren’t great at reading specific thoughts, but are really strong on telling whether someone is lying.
Then I got to a highlighted section. Here Mum had asked if they knew the real names of any of the subjects.
Each of them in turn said, no, their nana never let anyone see the last few pages of her notes, the appendix with the full names.
My mum pressed them harder:
Q: Why did she forbid you to read the last pages?
Reginald Shaw: My mother was determined that the names were to be kept confidential. These are real people and no one has the right to invade their privacy.
[truth]
Q: But surely they’re all dead now?
Lucy: We can’t assume that. Nana only died this summer and some of the subjects were younger than her.
[truth]
Q: Even if you plan to keep it confidential, as your great-grandmother wished, will you read the whole report sometime in the future?
Lucy: We can’t. We burnt her notes.
[truth]
Q: That’s very dramatic! Why?
Reginald: She didn’t want anyone following it up. Some of the subjects were humiliated by what she had done. Maybe they really believed in their spirits and their powers. And some of them were charged with fraud. She didn’t want it dragged up again. My mother was angry about the
Chronicle
article and made us promise to burn the notes without reading them. So we promised and we burnt them.
[truth]
Q: So none of you ever read the end of the report? Might anyone else have a copy of it? Who else worked on this project?
Reginald: Her assistant, Adam Lawrie, didn’t have access to all the information. She never trusted him with her notes, she preferred to be her own secretary, to keep her own secrets.
[truth]
Q: And what about the rest of the family? Your wife, Mr Shaw, or your other daughter, did they read the notes?
James Shaw: No, my wife isn’t that interested, and I’m sure Vivien didn’t read the full report either.
[truth, but also hesitation and protective, defensive feelings]
Q: Are you sure? I’d love to speak to her, if she did.
Lucy: No, she didn’t. Viv was really keen on keeping the notes,though, because she thought they represented the truth
That’s why the senior readers had hurtled down to London. To track Ivy Shaw.
I was right: the file confirmed she had died of natural causes, just after the article in the
Winslow Chronicle
.
Mum had posed as another journalist and interviewed some of the family as soon as the senior team arrived down south.
I clicked on the audio and heard Mum’s voice, introducingherself as Louise Allan, a freelance journalist. She was using a soft Irish accent – she says the only useful things she ever got from my dad was the skill of faking different accents.
She asked the interviewees to introduce themselves, for levels on the digital recorder.
“I’m Reginald Shaw, Ivy Shaw’s son.”
“I’m Reginald’s older son, James Shaw.”
“I’m Reginald’s younger son, Vincent Shaw.”
“I’m James’s younger daughter, Lucy Kingston Shaw. My older sister Vivien isn’t here, she’s got a debating competition at school. Anyway, she doesn’t think we should talk to you, not now Nana’s dead. Did your recorder pick all that up?”
I sat back hard when I heard Vivien’s sister. There was nothing wrong with Lucy Shaw’s voice. She had a perfectly nice middle-class BBC English voice. But she sounded like a happy and alive version of Vivien. Exactly like and completely different from the terrified girl in the van.
I shivered and clicked on Mum’s transcript instead. The first part of the interview covered the same ground as the local article: Ivy came from Jamaica to study, then she did vital war work, she became a teacher, had a family, and now her family think her work should be recognised, blah blah blah…
There were also notes under each answer from Uncle Hugh, who posed as a photographer so he could act as a truth-tester. Voice readers aren’t great at reading specific thoughts, but are really strong on telling whether someone is lying.
Then I got to a highlighted section. Here Mum had asked if they knew the real names of any of the subjects.
Each of them in turn said, no, their nana never let anyone see the last few pages of her notes, the appendix with the full names.
My mum pressed them harder:
Q: Why did she forbid you to read the last pages?
Reginald Shaw: My mother was determined that the names were to be kept confidential. These are real people and no one has the right to invade their privacy.
[truth]
Q: But surely they’re all dead now?
Lucy: We can’t assume that. Nana only died this summer and some of the subjects were younger than her.
[truth]
Q: Even if you plan to keep it confidential, as your great-grandmother wished, will you read the whole report sometime in the future?
Lucy: We can’t. We burnt her notes.
[truth]
Q: That’s very dramatic! Why?
Reginald: She didn’t want anyone following it up. Some of the subjects were humiliated by what she had done. Maybe they really believed in their spirits and their powers. And some of them were charged with fraud. She didn’t want it dragged up again. My mother was angry about the
Chronicle
article and made us promise to burn the notes without reading them. So we promised and we burnt them.
[truth]
Q: So none of you ever read the end of the report? Might anyone else have a copy of it? Who else worked on this project?
Reginald: Her assistant, Adam Lawrie, didn’t have access to all the information. She never trusted him with her notes, she preferred to be her own secretary, to keep her own secrets.
[truth]
Q: And what about the rest of the family? Your wife, Mr Shaw, or your other daughter, did they read the notes?
James Shaw: No, my wife isn’t that interested, and I’m sure Vivien didn’t read the full report either.
[truth, but also hesitation and protective, defensive feelings]
Q: Are you sure? I’d love to speak to her, if she did.
Lucy: No, she didn’t. Viv was really keen on keeping the notes,though, because she thought they represented the truth
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